YouTube hasn’t provided much insight into the inner workings of its algorithms in the past. But, the company has decided to provide users with some valuable learnings in the form of answered questions about its search and discovery systems.
In a new video shared on the Creator Insider Channel, Product Manager of YouTube Discovery, Rachel Alves, addresses 5 key questions asked by YouTube creators surrounding the use of tags, recommendations, algorithm updates, and more.
If you’d prefer to skim over the answers in written form, check out the below:
Should you share your videos outside of YouTube, given YouTube may not be able to attribute all the engagement metrics off-platform?
Rachel says that creators should most definitely share their videos outside of the platform as it can only increase your chances of discovery based on viewer activity, regardless of direct attribute.
“If your videos are getting more traffic from external sources, like social media, it’s likely increasing your potential to be discovered by more viewers. Another benefit is that those viewers now have that video in their watch history, so there’s a higher likelihood that they may be recommended one of your other videos in the future.”
Why do people get recommendations for videos uploaded 10-12 years ago?
YouTube’s Product Manager of Discovery says that YouTube’s system is designed to match viewers with videos that they are likely to enjoy, regardless of when that video was published; meaning older videos that still retain relevancy will see relatively high engagement and continue to be to recommended in line with viewer interests.
YouTube needs a new way to highlight new creators
Alves speaks about how viewers ask for this, and notes that YouTube recently rolled out its ‘New to You’ tab that highlights more channels from outside of each viewers’ regular viewing experience.
When applying video tags, should you focus on specific tags or more broad matching topics to maximise discovery?
Although video tags are an important way for creators to align their content with specific queries, YouTube notes that tags are not a major algorithm consideration.
“Tags are descriptive keywords you can add to your video to help viewers find your content. Your video’s title, thumbnail, and description are more important pieces of metadata for your video’s discovery. These main pieces of information help viewers decide which videos to watch.”
Has YouTube changed its algorithm recently?
According to Alves, YouTube is constantly making changes to its algorithms. She also notes that there is a trend of increased possible algorithm changes at this time of the year.
This is likely because of large-scale shifts in viewer behavior, where channels see a change in their metrics on weekdays vs. weekends. Something like this could make it seem like something has changed with the algorithm when really the shift is relative to viewer behavior caused by external lifestyle shifts.
Although these new insights don’t necessarily provide any mountain moving insights, it does provide some vital context as to how YouTube’s systems work. To many, this could help them better understand some of the elements, and use them to their advantage.
